


Three-Quarter Time

by ALC_Punk



Category: Doctor Who (1963), Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-08-23
Updated: 2006-08-23
Packaged: 2017-11-27 04:00:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/657818
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ALC_Punk/pseuds/ALC_Punk
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Three short scenes of Romana having adventures on her own, written for the Romanathon</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three-Quarter Time

**Author's Note:**

> Requests: Romana having a chat to Harriet Jones, Something with Romana stuck on Earth and having to work with UNIT and preferably Lethbridge-Stewart, Romana/Rani. Lyrics belong to Zita Swoon.

'I would have kept you forever...'

=--

Harriet Jones wasn't precisely what Romana expected. The woman looked almost tired as she stepped into the suite of rooms that she resided in while Parliament was in session. Tired instead of full of purpose and vision. Not quite the leader toppled for her overweening pretention. Perched in a chair, her knees drawn up to her chest, Romana knew she herself looked rather like a child awaiting her parent. "He does that a lot, you know."

The words made Jones jump, and the steel returned to her frame as she turned to face Romana. 

Before she could speak, Romana said, "He's very good at it. Toppling governments."

"Well, he hasn't toppled this one," Jones replied frostily.

"But he has made inroads, Harriet." 

"You will address me as Prime Minister Jones, or not at all, girl." 

"Yes. I do know who you are, Harriet Jones." MP for Flydale North, and Romana had to wonder how much the Doctor had or hadn't seen when he'd been there last. 

"And who the bloody devil are you?"

"Quite." Romana replied succinctly, to the second word. She ignored the blasphemy and sailed on, "I would rather like some tea. I suspect you require some."

As if it were the most natural thing in the world, Harriet moved to the door and opened it. "Swanson, please bring me tea. And make it for two." Or perhaps it was natural for her to follow the lead of someone else--either that, or Romana's suggestion was true.

"Yes, ma'am." A calm voice replied.

Harriet moved and took the chair across from Romana, "You're right. Tea would be rather lovely."

Two minutes later, the silence fallen having been perfectly cordial, Swanson wheeled in the tea things. The young woman cast Romana a cursory glance, then ignored her, leaving as swiftly as she'd arrived. Harriet poured the tea, handing over the saucer with practiced ease.

"So, my dear, you were about to explain yourself." Harriet coaxed.

"I suppose I was. My name is Romana, and I'm a friend of the Doctor's."

"Yes, I know."

"Wait. I haven't been here yet, have I?" Romana looked suddenly faintly worried. "I dislike getting my time lines crossed rather excessively. It's so untidy."

Harriet turned her tea cup round and tilted her head, "He's rather untidy himself."

"So I haven't been here?"

"No, but it seemed rather obvious. Your manner is quite like his, right down to the inherent superiority."

It might have been an insult. Romana allowed it to slip past her, unnoticed. Besides, Harriet Jones was quite probably right. And as a Time Lord, she was superior to a mere human. "Leaving him aside, you do realize that in a few short years, many things will change?"

"Will they?"

"Yes. Cities will fall, planets will crumble to dust. Inevitably, the humans of Earth will begin a meteoric rise to mediocrity." 

"And life will go on."

Romana took a sip of her tea and closed her eyes as the liquid slid down her throat, bringing back odd fragments of memory. "Yes. Life always goes on, in its way."

"What did you want, Romana?"

"I..."

Silence fell again, the only movement the tea cups. Neither touched the biscuits or cake, though the latter looked rather lovely and gooey. 

Romana dropped her feet to the floor and pushed her chair back. "I should--" she stood, "--go."

"Did you come to ensure he'd done the job right?" Harriet looked suddenly tired again. 

"I came..." Romana dropped her gaze to the carpet, eyes following the abstract pattern before she looked back up and met the other woman's gaze. "There will come a time when you have him within your grasp, and I... I would ask that you grant him leniency."

"You would ask."

"Yes." Though she had no right to. Not herself. But the Doctor probably had years, decades of right to be granted leniency. "UNIT, the world, the galaxy--he's owed a very lot, though he's..."

"Perhaps."

Romana gently set her cup down in the saucer. "I really should be going."

"And there are meetings to see to."

"And Torchwood to inform."

Harriet met her gaze and half-smiled, "It's a wonder you don't take him in hand, my dear."

"That would be pointless," Romana replied, tone crisp. "He does well enough on his own. And I do well enough on mine." And she had taken him in hand once, and then she'd needed to strike out on her own. With a nod to the prime minister, Romana turned and walked across the room, activating the teleport button in mid-step.

To the eyes of Harriet Jones, she simply vanished.

=--

'Instead of taking another way...'

=--

A scrap of paper sat on the console accusingly for three days until she finally tossed down her Keats and swore at it in Mandarin. Not that it was the paper's fault, but Romana felt rather that she shouldn't have to do what it required. Besides, its presence had meant she'd read the same five pages in succession ten times, and once upside-down.

Setting the coordinates was rather easier than she'd thought it would be.

-

"This is very ridiculous," said Romana. She surveyed the group of soldiers holding her at gunpoint with scorn. Really, it was the outside of enough that she'd come to help--of course, perhaps she could blame him for that. Causing them to be all manner of paranoid at the drop of the hat. Truly, he was a menace. However, she raised her eyebrows and met the eyes of the man in charge. "Is this the best you can do?"

"I assure you, madame, we can offer better," he retorted. The military bearing was etched into every line of his being, and Romana caught the fleeting impression that he'd been born in a khaki jumper and boots.

"You're Brigadier Lethbridge-Stewart. Have you learned nothing in the time you've spent with the Doctor?" Romana stepped around the men and their guns as if they weren't really there.

The Brigadier blinked. "It appears you have an advantage I do not."

Romana didn't tell him that she rather liked it that way. Although, sometimes, it was better to have your ally underestimate you. Her enemies certainly did. They saw a sweet girl with strawberry-blonde hair and guileless eyes. They usually got over that when she--to borrow a phrase she'd heard recently--kicked their asses.

"The advantage may end up belonging to no one," she informed him. "Unless you're here on the heath for a summer holiday?"

It was unseasonably warm, with no sign of the normal fog which should be skittering along the ground and crowding under the bushes. Romana recalled having to walk for miles in the most atrocious shoes (though she'd rather loved them, at the time). She didn't smile down at her serviceable galoshes, as that would be rather silly. And she was attempting to be dignified.

A glance at the sunlight while the soldiers seemed to try to decide precisely what they were supposed to do told her she had little time. Or perhaps, given her current predicament, she amended as a gun barrel pressed into her back, all the time in the world.

"Just who might you be, miss?" The Brigadier had dropped confusion for bluster and the certain knowledge that he was exactly where he was supposed to be while she was not.

"My name is Fred," she replied mildly. "And I'm here for what is probably the same reason you are."

His eyebrows shot up, and he snorted. "Fred? Young lady, if you refuse to reply correctly, I shall be forced to--" 

"Have your men shoot me? I rather doubt that."

"Have you detained." He glared at her for the interruption.

She beamed at him, "But that would lessen my usefulness, and, really, Brigadier, you're going to need me."

"I? Need you?"

Romana fumbled with the new watch she'd bought for this occasion, and sighted along her finger towards the tree line. "Quite."

On cue, metallic creatures exited the trees, swarming along the heath towards the suddenly surprised soldiers. They turned their weapons from Romana to the approaching threat. Obviously, they deemed it far more worthy than she. 

Not that she blamed them. Metallic bugs were rather obnoxiously disturbing.

"Your guns won't work on them, Brigadier."

"Then what would you suggest, Fred?" He asked, tone full of irony.

"Retreat. Unless you happen to have something I could cross-connect circuits on to produce an electro-magnetic pulse wave with." The offer was hopeful. After all, it was just possible he had a random generator laying about in his pocket that she could use.

It was the military, after all. They went in for that sort of pointless tom-foolery. Back-ups and triple-enforced concrete bunkers and the like. Or maybe it was the boy scouts that were always prepared. she frowned. Perhaps UNIT should adopt their motto.

The metal things were closer, their clanking and whirring disconcerting in the pleasant afternoon air. Warm though it was, she felt the urge to shiver and suppressed it. She should be past this sort of thing. They were only machines, this was only Earth, there were only humans surrounding her. Cannon-fodder, of course. And she reflected that that was probably a terrible designation to give them.

But the approaching machines wouldn't care what they destroyed in their path. Human, animal, vegetable, gallifreyan, mineral. All would be consumed.

"A simple pulse, you say?"

"If my calculations are correct," Romana replied.

"Very well." He raised his voice, "Retreat to the bunker!"

The UNIT soldiers straightened, saluted, and began retreating in as orderly a fashion as they could muster. Romana went with them, watching and waiting.

The wave of machines reached the straggling end of the column, and a horrible scream rent the air. Gunfire broke out, the bullets doing little to the machines as they splashed into them. Romana found herself moving towards the beleaguered soldier, sonic screwdriver in hand.

She thrust it at the mandible of the spider latched onto the boy's leg, and it reared back with a strange screech. "Quickly! Move!"

And move they did, hastening from their attackers.

They were lucky the creatures could only move so fast. Really, it was something of a design flaw, Romana decided as they finally out-distanced the things. But then, they didn't have to be fast, they simply had to continue to move to accomplish their goals.

Asking metallic bugs what their plans were was probably not something that would be conducive, however. She rather doubted they were planning on settling down with the American 2.5, white picket fence and dog. Or cat.

Romana rather liked cats. And K-9 was a girl's best friend.

The bunker was a medium-sized trailer filled with the latest equipment. To Romana, it was a bit nostalgia inducing, and she patted the radio and considered pulling one of the tubes out to let it know how cute it was. And obsolete. While the soldiers tended to their wounded, she found the leads to the generator (sadly, not in the Brigadier's pocket) and began fiddling with it. Stopping to ask permission would have been pointless.

Of course, he probably had to object, for form's sake, "What in the dickens are you doing, miss Fred?"

"Cross-feeding the current, Brigadier." She popped her screwdriver in her mouth to forestall further questions.

In a short time, the clanking of the approaching army could be heard. 

"Not meaning to rush you, Fred--"

"Call me Romana," she muttered around the sonic contraption.

He raised an eyebrow, she was sure of it, "Romana, not that I intend to rush you--"

She twisted one last connection and retrieved her screwdriver, ignoring the slight damp, "But time is of the essence. Yes, I rather imagine it always is."

A spider-leg broke through the side of the trailer as though it were cheese-cloth, and Romana reached out and switched on the generator. There was a moment, when it seemed as through the trailer would be lifted up and ripped into shreds for food by the several hundred metal insects. And then they all screamed as the earlier one had. 

The trailer shuddered, and the leg withdrew itself as the metallic monsters dropped to the ground, suddenly lifeless. 

Romana left the generator on, ignoring the slight scent of burnt plastic. She had more pressing things to deal with. The Brigadier was ahead of her, however, already heading for the exit, voice booming as he laid orders for a clean-up detail to be called in.

Surveying the mess outside over his shoulder as he stepped down to the ground, Romana was rather glad she wouldn't be left to deal with it. 

There was something oddly sad about the lifeless creatures. Some had stayed upright, most had fallen to the side or curled onto their backs, as though to protect themselves from the inevitable. 

"Is there a further suggestion you would make?" The Brigadier asked quietly. 

"Sir, our radios are out," called the Sergeant. 

"They would be, from the EM pulse," Romana explained calmly. "As for a suggestions, I recommend seeing these smelted down as quickly as possible."

"Are there more?"

Glancing towards the woods in the distance, she shook her head. "No. The hive travels together." And K-9 should have destroyed their spacecraft by now. He was such a dependable friend. 

"Can they be re-animated?"

"I believe so." 

Lethbridge-Stewart nodded, "The scientists will object to the destruction, but I'll see to it."

"Good man." She smiled slightly. 

"Where is the Doctor, by the way?"

It was a question she couldn't answer, not with any truth to the matter, "I expect he's on holiday." She deepened her smile, letting it turn elfin, "I do apologize for the inconvenience, Brigadier. But he does like to leave these little notes." She pulled the one from her pocket. 

The parchment was the same as the scrap the Brigadier pulled from his own. There was a tear at one end that, she was certain, would match against the ragged edge of hers. "He does believe in planning now," he murmured.

"I'd rather not discuss him." Romana crumpled hers into a ball and let it drop. In the distance, she caught a flash of movement. "And I really should be going, Brigadier. Though it was quite lovely to meet you."

"Romana."

She looked at him.

For just a moment, he seemed about to say something full of importance, then the moment flashed into the past, and he shrugged, "I suppose Whitehall will believe that an assistant of the Doctor's arrived in the nick of time."

"They ought to believe the truth."

"Truth is changeable, miss Fred."

He really was a rather extraordinary man, she decided. She could see why the Doctor could never quite let him go. But she didn't tell him her thoughts, "Goodbye, Brigadier." She held out her hand.

He shook it, smiling, "Good luck, Romana."

With another smile, she tipped her hat to the lads beginning to stack the bugs into a pile and then turned and headed off to meet K-9 at her TARDIS.

After all, there were ten more slips of paper, scrawled, half-finished notes, and sixteen alien invasions to spike the guns of. It would be a very profitable year. 

Perhaps she could topple a government or two.

=--

'I saw her face and her elegant taste...'

=--

She remembered standing on a street corner, the year was 1979. Humanity floated around her, blown by fate, detritus, and time. From her vantage point, she could see the Rani make her way down the block, dark eyes taking in everything as she moved. The leather on her legs and the low-cut crimson top weren't out of place. She needed a few more chains, of course. But in this type of crowd, one would always need more chains.

It was always easier to blend, at speed, with a large crowd. Especially if they were male. Them getting distracted by the sight of Romana in skin-tight pink leather gave her room to maneuver. Her stilettos were a bit uncomfortable, though, and she wondered if she'd really needed to fit into the time.

Another corner turned, and Romana almost lost the Rani in the crowd. Then she spotted her entrance into the pub across the way and loitered her way to stand outside the door a moment. 

Plunging into the humanity inside was like pricking her skin with a needle and shoving illicit drugs into her circulation system. Skin-popping, without the unsightly scars. Frenetic chaos surrounded her on all sides, and she couldn't avoid the press. Couldn't help but bump against arms and sides, hands touching her ass, fingers brushing her stomach. Sometimes, they weren't accidents. But the glazed look told her they mostly didn't realize what they were doing. No harm done, even as the sweat slid down her back from the heat that was packed into the place.

It was Earth, it was the late 70's, and it was chaos personified. It made no sense for a scientist so steeped in the scientific method, until one realized she was always able to find ready test subjects for any experiment she could imagine or fashion.

Still, too, like him they're drawn by the frills and decadence of humanity. Earth is like an intoxication, a drug. It goes right to the head and spreads through the veins until your fingertips tingle with excitement.

It was, Romana reflected as she stopped at the bar, eyes tracking the Rani in the mirror over the bar, something to write a full-scale thesis-driven paper on. If one were inclined to that sort of academic pursuit. She filed the idea away for a later date, and turned her attention to the woman slipping into the backroom.

She wasn't entirely sure why she was there--Romana knew the Rani was there to conduct research. She just wasn't certain why the scribbled note she'd gotten while on holiday on Fleurana had sent her jaunting back here.

Perhaps she just enjoyed fixing his mistakes.

-

"He always did like the schoolgirl type." There was a supercilious sneer to the look the Rani was bestowing upon her.

Romana shrugged, leaning against the wall. "Or perhaps he's simply ours." The alley was stereotypical of its type: dank, dirty, a hundred bits of peoples' lives spilled out of trash bins in a stench and disarray that clung to the back of the throat. Brick walls, cobbled street, a light barely reaching from one end, the other capped with another bar.

A bark of laughter, cut off as abruptly as it began. "Speak, girl. There must be a reason for your to follow me. Or has he trained you like the best lap dogs of Britain?"

Smiling thinly, Romana shook her head, "You do remember this is his favorite planet? Or was that a part of your plan?"

"Humanity is full of chaos. I intend--"

"To bring it to order?" Romana knew her ironically-raised eyebrow would probably be ignored. "How very pretentious of you."

"Yes."

It would be so simple to squash the Rani like a bug. Having seen far too much of human suffering, Romana would be perfectly willing to do it. But some part of her balked at the idea of reducing the number of Time Lords left in the universe by one. Even if that one were quite sociopathologically hazardous to the health of a large number of planets. If she were a little more cold-blooded, Romana reflected, perhaps she could have been the Rani.

"I suppose you've come to stop me, then." She sounded bored.

"You're as arrogant as I've read," Romana said musingly. "I'm not sure you can match, say, Rassilon himself for it, but you're rather near the level of the Master."

"Pah. That fool is all flash and little substance."

"Is he? And yet I haven't found him." A lie. Romana knew precisely where the Master was, she just didn't think there was cause for alarm, there. The cheetah planet would keep him imprisoned until the Doctor could work his time round to sorting it out. If he hadn't already.

"He hasn't come crawling out of the muck, yet. Give him time, girl. I'm sure he'll be pleased to get caught by the likes of you."

"Possibly." Romana drew the taser from the holster, feeling again a vague distaste for the use of such anachronistic weaponry. Really, a shotgun with hollow-point shells would have been superior. Rather Annie Get Your Gun, and she should have remembered to get fringe on her jacket. "However, leaving him aside, I'm afraid you really are going to have to halt your experiments."

"And you're going to stop me with that?" The Rani asked scornfully.

"Yes. I did consider killing you outright, but 'twould be rather a waste of your brain, don't you think? Instead, I believe I'll just shoot you and then leave you somewhere you can do some sort of good."

The Rani put her hands on her hips. "And what makes you think I won't escape easily?" 

"Your Tardis stays with me." Romana pulled the trigger, watching with interest as the suddenly stunned Rani fell to the ground, one of her hands pulling a syringe from her pocket. "So that's what you were going for." 

She kicked it away, then stepped on it, feeling it break beneath her boot. "Good riddance."

Nudging the recumbent Rani with her toe, Romana sighed. "I really need to learn to plan a bit better." She fished the anti-gravity repulsor from a jacket pocket. "Still, any port in a storm..."

Fastening the small nodule to the Rani, she activated it, and the woman began rising from the ground. "Really shouldn't have drunk so much, Rani," Romana announced as she stepped from the alley, one of the Rani's arms over her shoulder, her own around the woman's waist. "I bloody hate dragging your ass home."

Most of the people passing ignored them, though the black and pink leather garnered catcalls two corners down. 

Once at her Tardis, she leaned the other Time Lord against it. It was the work of a minute to open the door. Deciding not to take the risk, Romana pressed the taser to the Rani's side and pulled the trigger again. 

The anti-gravity repulsor gave a little beep and shut down.

"Oops."

Not bothering to catch the woman, Romana sighed and pocketed the weapon. "Really, this is becoming far more trouble than it's worth."

Romana stepped into her Tardis, then turned back and grabbed one handful of leather pants and dragged the limp form inside with her. Once fully in the console room, she dropped her and moved to shut the doors.

-

Strictly speaking, the deserted planet wasn't particularly going to ever become a technological marvel. In fact, if you wanted to strand someone for life, it was the perfect locale.

Romana chose a nice island, full of sandy beaches, clear-running streams, a variety of plants and game to eat, and shelter for when it would get cold. She dragged the Rani out the same way she'd been dragged into the Tardis. Once clear, she checked her pockets and anywhere else it seemed prudent, turning up one Tardis recall switch, three wallets and a necklace that looked as though it contained a piece of the key to time.

"Very dangerous for you to have this," Romana murmured before turning back to her Tardis. "I expect you'll be bored here. Can't particularly help that." She glanced back, not caring whether the Rani was awake or not. "Still, you could be ruler of this planet inside a year. Perhaps I'll check on you."

Back inside, with the doors closed, she pondered the pendant before slipping it into a pocket. "Must return _that_ to its original owner."


End file.
